Austrian troops on the Eastern Front during World War 1 battling Russian forces. During a lull in battle, they move cautiously among fallen soldiers, on the battlefield, seeking to help any still alive. Austro-Hungarian medics find and retrieve one wounded soldier on a stretcher.

The First Battle of the Masurian Lakes, September 1-7, 1914, in World War 1. Animated map shows maneuvering of German 8th Army forces under Paul von Hindenburg in East Prussia, against the Russian 1st Army under Paul von Rennenkampf. This is a German counter offensive following their victory against the German 2nd Army in the battle of Tannenberg, in August,. The animated map shows rapid movements of the German forces (reflecting their use of extensive rail networks in the area). Slate states that 350 thousand Russian prisoners were taken in this new quick German counterattack. Remainder of the sequence shows countless numbers of surrendered Russian First Army troops marching along a road.

German troops advance on the Eastern Front during World War 2. Russians employ scorched earth policy . Oil tanks ablaze and dams and structures blown up. Germans lay siege to Stalingrad. A Soviet troops in urban combat in Stalingrad. A German soldier is shot and falls. Views of awful destruction. Animated map showing Leningrad and the Gulf of Finland and Lake Ladoga on either side. Views of Leningrad in snow. Citizens bundled against the cold, walk near historic structures. Food being distributed. Soviet troops in defensive positions. Animated map shows outbreak of Soviet forces in pincer movement that surrounds the German 6th Army. Two Soviet armies meet as they close the pincer. German Field Marshal Friedrich Paulus surrendering to Soviet forces on 31 January 1943. Troops of the German 6th Army make their way through the snow as they surrender. Battlefield cemetery, with markers of German soldier's graves. Numerous Soviet citizens, victims of the fighting, seen lying in the snow, as relatives grieve. Scene shifts to the Pacific theater with view of Japanese bombers flying over an installation flying the Rising Sun flag. Scenes of the Pearl Harbor attack. American workers fill yard near a war plant during shift change. Defense industry workers in the plants. Liberty ships being launched. American forces in amphibious assaults. U.S. forces engaged in North Africa and on Pacific islands. American soldiers at battlefield gravesite. General Dwight D. Eisenhower with General Omar Bradley and Allied military leaders, look over a map of Europe, following the June 6th invasion in Normandy. Fields filled with Sherman tanks and other war materiel, in England. The wing of an American airplane in D-day stripes as it takes off. Views from cockpit of an American bomber striking targets on D-day. B-17 bombers in formation at high altitude, leaving condensation trails in the sky. Pilots in cockpit of an American bomber, as they drop bombs. Allied fighters in D-day stripes peeling off to attack. Gun camera views of fighters strafing German targets. Explosions and fires.

Events after World War II. Harvesting in U.S. farms. Closeup view as a tractor plows fields. Men on horseback driving sheep. Woman serves a Thanksgiving turkey dinner to her family gathered at a nice dining room table in the United States. Her children look at the food with smiles. Contrasting scenes show Europeans starving amid post-war ruins. Women and children looking for food. A child in a soup line. Women wait in a line to receive grain that is weighed on a scale. Globe spins. Joseph Stalin and other Soviet officials watch a military parade in Red Square in Russia. Retrospective scenes of the meeting of Russian and U.S. troops at the Elbe River late in World War 2. Communist rally in Paris. A protester holds up a hammer and sickle symbol. A demonstration of protestors in Athens, Greece, and another Communist demonstration in Rome, Italy. Map depicts communist control growing over Central and Eastern Europe early in Cold War. High aerial view of Washington DC with a lower altitude airplane flying over the U.S. Capitol. Exterior view of State Department (Old Executive Office Building) in Washington DC. View of Secretary of State James F Byrnes working at his desk. Byrnes speaks of U.S. role in world affairs while at a conference in Stuttgart, Germany. Scenes from a meeting of the Big Four foreign ministers in 1947. Scenes changes to North Portico of White House. Swearing in ceremony of George C. Marshall as Secretary of State. President Harry S Truman shakes hands with Secretary George Marshall. Night view of London landmark buildings. View of door at No. 10 Downing Street in London. View of brutal winter conditions in Europe in February 1947. Citizens try to dig out a train stuck in snow. Women in line in Britain for a rationed good, still saddled with its own postwar reconstruction. Narrator relates that Britain was unable to continue to provide massive military and economic aid to the Greek regime and appealed to the U.S. to handle the situation. Secretary of State Marshall and President Truman seen talking together in front of a fireplace mantle. Marshall boards aircraft for a visit to Moscow. Truman in a White House meeting, seated at oval table with his advisors and cabinet. Truman addressing joint session of congress on March 12, 1947. He asks for funds for Greece and Turkey. Globe highlights USSR. Door sign reads 'Policy Planning Staff - George F Kennan - Director'. Director Kennan seen at his desk. He advocates a long term, patient but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansive tendencies. Reconstruction in Europe. Ground level and aerial views of bomb destroyed European cities, and workers cleaning up rubble. Brief scene from the meeting of 16 nations in Paris on July 3, 1947. Scenes from United Nations meeting held in Lake Success New York in September 1947. George Marshall at podium addressing delegates of UN. Russian delegate Andrey Vyshinsky commenting on Marshall Plan. Signing of Marshall Plan agreement by international delegates meeting in Paris in September 1947.

Goosestepping German troops on the march and German Panzer I tanks moving in formation across a field in World War 2. A formation of German Fieseler Fi 156 Storch airplanes in flight overhead, accompanied by two He-111 bombers. German paratroopers jumping from Ju-52 aircraft. Grand Admiral Erich Johann Albert Raeder head of the German Navy, making a statement. Bucolic scenes of European farm country and vineyards, with local people harvesting crops. Soviet troops marching on parade to a military band on the sidelines in Red Square, Moscow, soviet Union. Soviet motorcycle troops armed with light machine guns. Soviet T-26 light tanks in formation. Glimpse of Red Square, with St. Basil's Cathedral and other famous buildings. Soviet troops crossing a river on inflated boats. A long column of T-26 tanks moving along a dirt road. Sky filled with variety of Soviet warplanes, including four-engine bombers (with fixed landing gear) to bi-wing aircraft. Soviet paratroopers jumping from a Tupolev ANT-6 bomber. They climb out on the huge corrigated wing and slide off. View out past the tail of an ANT-6 bomber. Soviet Union and Japan conclude a neutrality pact. Views of the pact being signed by Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Mikhailovich Molotov for the Soviet Union and by Japanese Foreign Minister Matsuoka and Ambassador Yoshitsugu, for the Japanese, in Moscow on April 13, 1941. Joseph Stalin is observing in the center of the scene.